English grammar question
December 5, 2008 12:47 PM Subscribe
Please help me with a quick English grammar question.
I have been given a little "unsolicited constructive criticism" on few sentences I used in an email at work.
My sentences:
1. "The XYZ report needs tested."
2. "This needs assigned to a new release."
My friendly criticizer tells me that these must be changed to:
3. "The XYZ report needs to be tested."
4. "This needs to be assigned to a new release."
Is she right?
I have been given a little "unsolicited constructive criticism" on few sentences I used in an email at work.
My sentences:
1. "The XYZ report needs tested."
2. "This needs assigned to a new release."
My friendly criticizer tells me that these must be changed to:
3. "The XYZ report needs to be tested."
4. "This needs to be assigned to a new release."
Is she right?
Best answer: Yes. I think what you're writing is some sort of regional dialect. I never heard it until I moved to Iowa.
posted by King Bee at 12:52 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by King Bee at 12:52 PM on December 5, 2008
Or, alternatively, you could say:
"The XYZ report needs testing." and
"This needs assignment to a new release." - grammatically correct, but sounds awkward.
posted by widdershins at 12:54 PM on December 5, 2008
"The XYZ report needs testing." and
"This needs assignment to a new release." - grammatically correct, but sounds awkward.
posted by widdershins at 12:54 PM on December 5, 2008
Is she right?
Yes, for standard English. There are regional dialects that allow the "needs V+EN" construction, you probably speak one. This is common in the Pittsburgh area, and supposedly some areas of the UK; I hadn't heard Iowa before but that is possible. I have this construction as a consequence of my mother being from Pittsburgh.
posted by advil at 1:02 PM on December 5, 2008
Yes, for standard English. There are regional dialects that allow the "needs V+EN" construction, you probably speak one. This is common in the Pittsburgh area, and supposedly some areas of the UK; I hadn't heard Iowa before but that is possible. I have this construction as a consequence of my mother being from Pittsburgh.
posted by advil at 1:02 PM on December 5, 2008
I've never in all my US life (born in Detroit, raised in Boston, Indianapolis, St. Louis... now in Seattle) heard a regional dialect of that construction. Is that really true about Pittsburgh area?? Wow.
Anyway, w/o "to be" or the alternative form, it is incorrect. It is not even good abbreviation technique, for which the very shortest accepable might be "XYZ report needs test". And, Slenny, I fear, "badly needs grammar re-ed."
Respectfully submitted.
posted by yazi at 1:14 PM on December 5, 2008
Anyway, w/o "to be" or the alternative form, it is incorrect. It is not even good abbreviation technique, for which the very shortest accepable might be "XYZ report needs test". And, Slenny, I fear, "badly needs grammar re-ed."
Respectfully submitted.
posted by yazi at 1:14 PM on December 5, 2008
Never heard this until I met my husband from Columbus, Ohio. I'm from Chicago. We never used this. So if it's in Iowa, Pennsylvania, and Ohio, we could blame it on politics. Except Illinois is blue, too. Maybe we blame it on states being narrowly democratic? This is the Republicans' fault?
posted by orangemiles at 1:21 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by orangemiles at 1:21 PM on December 5, 2008
Yeah, I never knew about this until I read this AskMe.
posted by yarrow at 1:23 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by yarrow at 1:23 PM on December 5, 2008
Agree with the above. I've never seen this construction before (lived in South Dakota, Indiana, and Seattle). It looks entirely ungrammatical to me.
posted by 0xFCAF at 1:33 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by 0xFCAF at 1:33 PM on December 5, 2008
I'd say it's more like office-speak. That particular "too busy to use too many words" type of speech all too common today.
posted by Thorzdad at 1:33 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by Thorzdad at 1:33 PM on December 5, 2008
Your coworker is absolutely 100% correct, but now I'm fascinated by this construction as well. I've lived in Texas, Louisiana, Colorado, Oklahoma, California, New York and now D.C., pay an absurd amount of attention to the way different people construct their sentences and have never come across this.
Fascinating.
posted by Navelgazer at 1:36 PM on December 5, 2008 [1 favorite]
Fascinating.
posted by Navelgazer at 1:36 PM on December 5, 2008 [1 favorite]
You should thank your co-worker for pointing this out, as you are not making a very flattering impression of your education by writing like that.
It would be better, of course, if you avoided passive constructions entirely:
We must test the XYZ report.
We must assign this to a new release.
posted by grouse at 1:38 PM on December 5, 2008
It would be better, of course, if you avoided passive constructions entirely:
We must test the XYZ report.
We must assign this to a new release.
posted by grouse at 1:38 PM on December 5, 2008
I grew up in the suburbs of Detroit, some years in Portland (OR), and until I moved to Philadelphia and met people from Pittsburgh, I had never heard this construction before.
It's definitely regional/dialect construction, and most people I know from western PA (or wherever else it's prevalent) have seemed to realized this at some point. When they do use it, it's more self-mocking or for flavor. Sorry you had to be informed this in a work environment via "unsolicited constructive criticism."
posted by polexa at 1:38 PM on December 5, 2008
It's definitely regional/dialect construction, and most people I know from western PA (or wherever else it's prevalent) have seemed to realized this at some point. When they do use it, it's more self-mocking or for flavor. Sorry you had to be informed this in a work environment via "unsolicited constructive criticism."
posted by polexa at 1:38 PM on December 5, 2008
It's regional dialect. I've known people from Ohio and Pennsylvania who used that "needs ---" construction. As a lifelong west coaster, the first time I heard it I was pretty surprised to learn that it's pretty common, having never heard anything other than "needs to be ---" before.
posted by chez shoes at 1:45 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by chez shoes at 1:45 PM on December 5, 2008
Your friend is right.
I'm sure someone around you has dropped the "to be," but that will seem very strange to most people (i.e. it's wrong).
posted by Jaltcoh at 1:45 PM on December 5, 2008
I'm sure someone around you has dropped the "to be," but that will seem very strange to most people (i.e. it's wrong).
posted by Jaltcoh at 1:45 PM on December 5, 2008
Is English Slenny's first language? Maybe Slenny isn't from the States or isn't completely fluent in English. I can see how this would be a common mistake to make if that is the case.
posted by ourroute at 1:51 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by ourroute at 1:51 PM on December 5, 2008
I'd say it's more like office-speak. That particular "too busy to use too many words" type of speech all too common today.
This is completely wrong. It is a dialectal form that should be avoided in formal situations because people will misconstrue it as some kind of reflection on your intelligence and education, blissfully unaware that they themselves use forms that other people look down on them for. So goes the Circle of Linguistic Elitism.
It would be better, of course, if you avoided passive constructions entirely
Ridiculous. The passive, like every other English construction, has its place, and like every other construction, can be used wrongly or excessively.
posted by languagehat at 1:52 PM on December 5, 2008 [3 favorites]
This is completely wrong. It is a dialectal form that should be avoided in formal situations because people will misconstrue it as some kind of reflection on your intelligence and education, blissfully unaware that they themselves use forms that other people look down on them for. So goes the Circle of Linguistic Elitism.
It would be better, of course, if you avoided passive constructions entirely
Ridiculous. The passive, like every other English construction, has its place, and like every other construction, can be used wrongly or excessively.
posted by languagehat at 1:52 PM on December 5, 2008 [3 favorites]
Is English Slenny's first language? Maybe Slenny isn't from the States or isn't completely fluent in English. I can see how this would be a common mistake to make if that is the case.
Jesus, don't people bother reading the thread? It's a dialect form.
posted by languagehat at 1:53 PM on December 5, 2008 [3 favorites]
Jesus, don't people bother reading the thread? It's a dialect form.
posted by languagehat at 1:53 PM on December 5, 2008 [3 favorites]
Yes, she's right.
It would be better, of course, if you avoided passive constructions entirely:
Bullshit. If you want to make the case that the passive voice is overused, I won't disagree, but to say it should never be used is absurd.
We must test the XYZ report.
And what if it's not "we" who should be testing the XYZ report? Specifically, what if Slenny doesn't know who should be testing the XYZ report, but still wants to make the point that it needs to be tested? "The XYZ report needs to be tested" is the most concise and direct way of putting this.
(Or, looking at your statement, maybe you meant that Slenny specifically should avoid passive constructions, rather than meaning it as general advice for everyone. Because "...if you avoided passive constructions entirely" is ambiguous that way, while "...if passive constructions were avoided entirely" is not.)
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 1:54 PM on December 5, 2008
It would be better, of course, if you avoided passive constructions entirely:
Bullshit. If you want to make the case that the passive voice is overused, I won't disagree, but to say it should never be used is absurd.
We must test the XYZ report.
And what if it's not "we" who should be testing the XYZ report? Specifically, what if Slenny doesn't know who should be testing the XYZ report, but still wants to make the point that it needs to be tested? "The XYZ report needs to be tested" is the most concise and direct way of putting this.
(Or, looking at your statement, maybe you meant that Slenny specifically should avoid passive constructions, rather than meaning it as general advice for everyone. Because "...if you avoided passive constructions entirely" is ambiguous that way, while "...if passive constructions were avoided entirely" is not.)
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 1:54 PM on December 5, 2008
Never heard this until I met my husband from Columbus, Ohio.
Yes. I live in Columbus and it has a presence here.
posted by Solon and Thanks at 1:59 PM on December 5, 2008
Yes. I live in Columbus and it has a presence here.
posted by Solon and Thanks at 1:59 PM on December 5, 2008
The passive, like every other English construction, has its place, and like every other construction, can be used wrongly or excessively.
I agree but I don't think this is the place. And if the replacement is many cases of "X needs to be Y," then it is excessive. Anyway, this leaves grammar and goes into style. I'm not saying that repeating "needs to be" over and over again is wrong, just that it is ugly.
Bullshit. If you want to make the case that the passive voice is overused, I won't disagree, but to say it should never be used is absurd.
Well, it would be absurd, since I used a passive construction in the very comment recommending that he stop doing so. So clearly, that's not what I meant.
"The XYZ report needs to be tested" is the most concise and direct way of putting this.
In that case I agree, but if he does know that Bob will test the report, then he should include the information. The absence of this information is another thing that would become more clear if he wrote "We must X, we must Y, we must Z."
posted by grouse at 2:03 PM on December 5, 2008
I agree but I don't think this is the place. And if the replacement is many cases of "X needs to be Y," then it is excessive. Anyway, this leaves grammar and goes into style. I'm not saying that repeating "needs to be" over and over again is wrong, just that it is ugly.
Bullshit. If you want to make the case that the passive voice is overused, I won't disagree, but to say it should never be used is absurd.
Well, it would be absurd, since I used a passive construction in the very comment recommending that he stop doing so. So clearly, that's not what I meant.
"The XYZ report needs to be tested" is the most concise and direct way of putting this.
In that case I agree, but if he does know that Bob will test the report, then he should include the information. The absence of this information is another thing that would become more clear if he wrote "We must X, we must Y, we must Z."
posted by grouse at 2:03 PM on December 5, 2008
It sounds extremely weird to me to not have the "to be" in the sentence, to the point where my first thought was to reread the post and see if I missed that English isn't your first language or something. The comments reminded me that it's probably a regional thing.
Anyway, your criticizer is right, imo, for the reasons languagehat listed. People who haven't heard that construction before -- and I suspect more people haven't heard it than have -- are going to question whether you know English as a first language or not when they read it.
posted by Nattie at 2:16 PM on December 5, 2008
Anyway, your criticizer is right, imo, for the reasons languagehat listed. People who haven't heard that construction before -- and I suspect more people haven't heard it than have -- are going to question whether you know English as a first language or not when they read it.
posted by Nattie at 2:16 PM on December 5, 2008
"Tested" and "assigned" are past tense, and the rest of your sentences are written in present tense. Fix that, and you'll be fine.
posted by pdb at 2:30 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by pdb at 2:30 PM on December 5, 2008
Are you or your parents from from western PA/eastern Ohio? This is VERY common there. Most people don't even realize that it's incorrect grammar until they move out.
Anyhoo, you might be interested to read the comments in this blog entry.
posted by nikkorizz at 3:05 PM on December 5, 2008
Anyhoo, you might be interested to read the comments in this blog entry.
posted by nikkorizz at 3:05 PM on December 5, 2008
I live in southeastern Ohio and can vouch for this one being common down here. It has always bugged me...first time I noticed it was when a co-worker mentioned "My truck needs washed".
Or rather, "worshed".
posted by newfers at 3:26 PM on December 5, 2008
Or rather, "worshed".
posted by newfers at 3:26 PM on December 5, 2008
Scotland here: The consensus on our copy editing desk is that:
a) yes, we'd add in "to be",
b) it's not appallingly grammatically incorrect to our ears. If it was in a quote, we'd leave it -- we wouldn't put "needs [to be] tested" or similar
posted by bonaldi at 3:33 PM on December 5, 2008
a) yes, we'd add in "to be",
b) it's not appallingly grammatically incorrect to our ears. If it was in a quote, we'd leave it -- we wouldn't put "needs [to be] tested" or similar
posted by bonaldi at 3:33 PM on December 5, 2008
And of course I see from the thread that is linked above that we gave it to y'all. Sorry folks.
posted by bonaldi at 3:38 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by bonaldi at 3:38 PM on December 5, 2008
When I was going to school in Bloomington, IN for a couple of years between 1997 and 1999, I heard that all the time from "townies" and other folks that were native to the region (southern Indiana). My best friend, who is from Kenosha, WI, was living in a reduced-rent dorm where everyone had to contribute to chores. The chore-list was always written out as "floor needs vaccumed" and so on. It drove us both to distraction. And, as languagehat explains, we both thought that the woman who maintained the list was horribly uneducated (which only hightened the student-townie divide). I only figured out it was a dialect form when I started working in the residence cafeteria in the kitchens. That's also where I heard "worsh" for the very first time (instead of "wash").
Oh, and I'm from London, Ontario, mostly. The only dialect form I can think of from my hometown is the florid use of swear words among teenagers. I know all teens have filthy mouths, but when I was in high school, we said the sort of things that peeled paint. One day, our swearing will be recognized as a distinct cultural practice and we will get the funding and protection our fithy mouths deserve.
posted by LMGM at 4:05 PM on December 5, 2008
Oh, and I'm from London, Ontario, mostly. The only dialect form I can think of from my hometown is the florid use of swear words among teenagers. I know all teens have filthy mouths, but when I was in high school, we said the sort of things that peeled paint. One day, our swearing will be recognized as a distinct cultural practice and we will get the funding and protection our fithy mouths deserve.
posted by LMGM at 4:05 PM on December 5, 2008
Second chime-in from Scotland - you hear this construction sometimes in colloquial Scots, but in terms of Standard English adding 'to be' is definitely preferable.
posted by Happy Dave at 4:32 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by Happy Dave at 4:32 PM on December 5, 2008
"Tested" and "assigned" are past tense, and the rest of your sentences are written in present tense. Fix that, and you'll be fine.
what
They're past participles. Their past-ness isn't the problem. They work in sentences of all sorts: "It had to be tested", "It is being tested right now", "It will have to be tested".
posted by CKmtl at 4:58 PM on December 5, 2008
what
They're past participles. Their past-ness isn't the problem. They work in sentences of all sorts: "It had to be tested", "It is being tested right now", "It will have to be tested".
posted by CKmtl at 4:58 PM on December 5, 2008
I had never heard this construction before I lived in Pittsburgh. I met several Pittsburgh natives who didn't realize that this kind of phrasing wasn't universally acceptable. Now I like to use it because it confuses people.
posted by ludwig_van at 6:08 PM on December 5, 2008
posted by ludwig_van at 6:08 PM on December 5, 2008
Er, I'll just post here what I posted in the other AskMe thread linked above. The short answer, though, is that yes, this construction is not recognized in the standard written English used in offices. Still, don't get pushed around about what is supposedly ungrammatical by people who don't know what they're talking about.
A recent piece from the Boston Globe points out:
posted by chinston at 9:52 PM on December 5, 2008 [1 favorite]
A recent piece from the Boston Globe points out:
But there's another recent use of need, about the same vintage as needs fixed, that we all find acceptable: The OED's first example, from 1911, is "Any dirty work you need done." That is, if the thing being fixed (washed, done) is the object rather than the subject of the verb, we like it just fine. She needs it done today.This raises an interesting point - that few people, if any, are are offended by "he needs the car washed," and yet it's hard to think of any meaningful difference (other than the subject-object switch) between that and the other horrible, awful, grating, annoying, weird, and "wrong" instances of dropped "to be" in this thread. Second, mentioned by the Globe is a brief discussion on Language Log, a blog populated by real-life linguists, which notes:
And yet, the same infinitive is omitted in both expressions:
He needs the car [to be] washed.
The car needs [to be] washed.
Why would the first become standard while the second remained a minority usage? Maybe because, with needs to be fixed and needs fixing already in circulation, there was little demand for the third variation, needs fixed.
The answers that linguists give are rarely fully satisfying to the questioners. Mostly, we explain the history of a variant, if we know it or can find it out, and we appeal to general mechanisms of change -- of sound change, syntactic change, semantic change, borrowing, lexical innovation, and so on. So we say that the construction in needs washed is just a continuation of a pattern in the speech of Scots-Irish settlers in the U.S. When pressed further, we explain that the construction makes syntactic sense: the subject of needs washed is understood as the object of the verb WASH, so the semantics here is a lot like the semantics of the passive, and we use the past participle form (washed) in the passive, so why not use it here?Much of the time, the answer depends on nothing more than chance.
At this point, our questioner is likely to say that that's all fine and good, but why did the Scots-Irish, and not other people, innovate this variant?
posted by chinston at 9:52 PM on December 5, 2008 [1 favorite]
"Needs tested" - it's alive and well in West Yorkshire. Never have seen it in an email, though.
Dropping the ablative "to" (motion towards) seems to be really common here as well. "Bring it me" vs "Bring it to me"
It's definitely a regional thing. I thought it was a Yorkshireism but if the Scots have it, too...
I might be completely off track, and I freely admit my lack of any sort of linguistic training. I wonder if it isn't an effect of how the English in a particular area developed on the German/French axis. "That needs to be tested" sounds a bit like the French habit of using etre or faire as helping verbs. I seem to remember from my very distant German in school that it doesn't have as many of those sorts of verbs as a language. It's a bit more like Latin in the sense that the declension of the word tells you if it's the subject/object/indirect object, or if it's moving towards or away from you, etc.
It's all allegedly English, but if you've never picked up the linguistic habit of adding in all the "to be" "to do", etc to help the sentence along or to transmit meaning, I don't think you would see the point of adding in all the frippery. Scottish English is its own thing, but Yorkshire dialect, for one, has quite a bit of very German/Scandanavian/Ur-English language to it without really trying.
Just a thought...
posted by Grrlscout at 2:37 AM on December 6, 2008
Dropping the ablative "to" (motion towards) seems to be really common here as well. "Bring it me" vs "Bring it to me"
It's definitely a regional thing. I thought it was a Yorkshireism but if the Scots have it, too...
I might be completely off track, and I freely admit my lack of any sort of linguistic training. I wonder if it isn't an effect of how the English in a particular area developed on the German/French axis. "That needs to be tested" sounds a bit like the French habit of using etre or faire as helping verbs. I seem to remember from my very distant German in school that it doesn't have as many of those sorts of verbs as a language. It's a bit more like Latin in the sense that the declension of the word tells you if it's the subject/object/indirect object, or if it's moving towards or away from you, etc.
It's all allegedly English, but if you've never picked up the linguistic habit of adding in all the "to be" "to do", etc to help the sentence along or to transmit meaning, I don't think you would see the point of adding in all the frippery. Scottish English is its own thing, but Yorkshire dialect, for one, has quite a bit of very German/Scandanavian/Ur-English language to it without really trying.
Just a thought...
posted by Grrlscout at 2:37 AM on December 6, 2008
Congratulations, you're using the old dialect of Scots! Its a beautiful example of regional dialect being transferred to a new place. I'm rather insulted that people think it sounds awful, theres absolutely nothing wrong with it - however, like all non-Standard Englishes, I would avoid it in writing. The examples that are usually given in Scots linguistics are 'My hair needs washing', etc.
Remember, Standard English is only a dialect like any other, its just that it was chosen because it was spoken by those with the money and the political power - when others wanted to be in that group they copied the wealthy and powerful, including their way of speech and writing. Standards only develop when there is a need for it - usually it is linked to the formation of a nation-state. It creates 'in-groups' and 'out-groups' - guess which group Scots was in? Scots nearly developed its own standard, but London printers and the Union of the Crowns put paid to all that.
I find it absurd when people take the piss out of the way others use language - don't you all realise that you're ALL speaking in dialect?
posted by meosl at 5:06 AM on December 6, 2008 [1 favorite]
Remember, Standard English is only a dialect like any other, its just that it was chosen because it was spoken by those with the money and the political power - when others wanted to be in that group they copied the wealthy and powerful, including their way of speech and writing. Standards only develop when there is a need for it - usually it is linked to the formation of a nation-state. It creates 'in-groups' and 'out-groups' - guess which group Scots was in? Scots nearly developed its own standard, but London printers and the Union of the Crowns put paid to all that.
I find it absurd when people take the piss out of the way others use language - don't you all realise that you're ALL speaking in dialect?
posted by meosl at 5:06 AM on December 6, 2008 [1 favorite]
My hair needs washing
That's standard English. "My hair needs washed" is not.
posted by grouse at 6:48 AM on December 6, 2008
That's standard English. "My hair needs washed" is not.
posted by grouse at 6:48 AM on December 6, 2008
I definitely heard it a lot growing up in Ohio. It was explained to me back then that it had its origins in the languages that many of Ohio's earlier residents spoke (German? Or maybe something from the Amish communities?). I have no idea if that's accurate or not, but it's really cool to see this weird Ohioism coming back to visit like an old friend...
posted by AngerBoy at 8:00 AM on December 6, 2008
posted by AngerBoy at 8:00 AM on December 6, 2008
Surely you pick up the differences between your spoken dialect and the standard language when you start to read?
posted by mr. strange at 11:05 PM on December 6, 2008
posted by mr. strange at 11:05 PM on December 6, 2008
Surely you pick up the differences between your spoken dialect and the standard language when you start to read?
Actually, quite possibly not; in a case like this the standard form is also grammatical to speakers who accept "needs+participle", so they have no reason to find a problem with the plain participial form by hearing the infinitival form. I even grew up a voracious reader in MA (where no one does this), and wasn't aware that this construction was non-standard until as an undergrad I took a historical linguistics class where the professor gave us a sheet of 20 or so examples of sentences from non-standard and past dialects of English, including one of these. And at that point I'd even been a linguistics major for a few years.
Of course for dialects or constructions that diverge more significantly, you would pick up the differences much more easily. But I'd bet that many of you have some tiny little non-standard parts of your grammar, and don't know it (hence languagehat's circle of linguistic elitism).
posted by advil at 6:48 AM on December 7, 2008
Actually, quite possibly not; in a case like this the standard form is also grammatical to speakers who accept "needs+participle", so they have no reason to find a problem with the plain participial form by hearing the infinitival form. I even grew up a voracious reader in MA (where no one does this), and wasn't aware that this construction was non-standard until as an undergrad I took a historical linguistics class where the professor gave us a sheet of 20 or so examples of sentences from non-standard and past dialects of English, including one of these. And at that point I'd even been a linguistics major for a few years.
Of course for dialects or constructions that diverge more significantly, you would pick up the differences much more easily. But I'd bet that many of you have some tiny little non-standard parts of your grammar, and don't know it (hence languagehat's circle of linguistic elitism).
posted by advil at 6:48 AM on December 7, 2008
This structure somehow made me cringe. It isn't ambiguous and the meaning is clear from context, but I don't think I'd get used to it easily.
My interpretation of why is that “tested”, normally a past participle (can be used wherever an adjective is expected), is used at a place where I expect a noun. “Testing” is the natural alternative: -ing makes a noun from a verb. An infinitive is another way of translating from a verb to a noun, so “this needs to assign a new release” grammatically works, and switching to passive “this needs to be assigned a new release” gets the intended meaning.
Aside to chinston: “Anything you need done” is standard; it can be derived from “You need it done”, which commutes with “You see it full” (Pronoun Verb Pronoun Adjective).
posted by Tobu at 1:20 PM on December 7, 2008
My interpretation of why is that “tested”, normally a past participle (can be used wherever an adjective is expected), is used at a place where I expect a noun. “Testing” is the natural alternative: -ing makes a noun from a verb. An infinitive is another way of translating from a verb to a noun, so “this needs to assign a new release” grammatically works, and switching to passive “this needs to be assigned a new release” gets the intended meaning.
Aside to chinston: “Anything you need done” is standard; it can be derived from “You need it done”, which commutes with “You see it full” (Pronoun Verb Pronoun Adjective).
posted by Tobu at 1:20 PM on December 7, 2008
Aside to chinston: “Anything you need done” is standard; it can be derived ...
That's right - it is completely standard, which is what the article I quoted was saying. I don't quite follow your explanation, but I'll just say that standardness can't be predicted or justified solely on the basis of application of logical rules, which I think is what you're suggesting.
posted by chinston at 7:35 PM on December 7, 2008
That's right - it is completely standard, which is what the article I quoted was saying. I don't quite follow your explanation, but I'll just say that standardness can't be predicted or justified solely on the basis of application of logical rules, which I think is what you're suggesting.
posted by chinston at 7:35 PM on December 7, 2008
Nthing the observation that this is a Pittsburgh/Western Pennsylvania-ism. Having grown up in the area, I'd say that I absolutely use this in casual situations, but (unconsciously) use the standard construction in written texts.
posted by Chrysostom at 7:46 AM on December 10, 2008
posted by Chrysostom at 7:46 AM on December 10, 2008
This thread is closed to new comments.
posted by widdershins at 12:52 PM on December 5, 2008